Food, Fitness + Toddlers

I hear it all the time: “I just don’t have time to work out and eat healthy with my kids” or “Life is too crazy to do the whole health thing right now.”

As a new(ish) mom, I understand the time crunch that comes with introducing little ones to your life, and I feel the struggle of trying to prioritize and keep your sanity along the way. However, I know that it is possible to lead a healthy lifestyle, even with kids. Yes, I’m finding that it’s even possible while pregnant and chasing around a toddler :)

For our family, sometimes this looks like workouts in our kitchen on days that have been too crazy to make it to the gym. When our son Bly was tiny, we incorporated him into our workouts as a weight for squats and lunges. Now as a toddler, he loves copying our movements and doing baby push-ups and burpees alongside us. We have fun making up quick, intense workouts that use the equipment we find around our home: everything from laundry detergent to water bottles.

This intersection of health and family also looks like grocery trips with Bly that take twice as long as they did before, but allow him to touch, see, and smell all the real, good foods out there. We fuel up with healthy snacks and expose Bly to all sorts of foods like acai bowls and smoothies. One of my goals for this year is to cook with Bly every week so that he can see how to plan and prepare a healthy meal.

Don’t get me wrong; it’s not always easy. But it’s worth it. First, keeping a workout routine keeps me sane and helps me physically, emotionally, and mentally better able to contribute to our family. More importantly, we’re teaching Bly with our daily actions. He will grow up knowing the importance of health because he sees us living that truth every day. As parents, we are always being watched and copied, so we try to make sure we live in a way we want Bly to copy.

Emily Breeze Ross Watson is one of the top personal trainers in the country and has competed at the highest level of fitness during the CrossFit Games. Breeze is also a new mom; she and her husband Montell Watson welcomed their first son, Bly Rhunar, in May 2016, and she’s now pregnant with #2. Throughout her pregnancies, Breeze continued to train in CrossFit, attracting worldwide media attention. She was soon catapulted to social media fame and became a global fitness inspiration promoting a healthy, active lifestyle throughout all stages of life. Aside from training clients and leading Charlotte’s largest bootcamp, she also coaches a broad online community through her social media accounts and recently launched website and app!